Wednesday, March 01, 2006

The End of Time Arguments Spread Fear

The End of Time Arguments Spread FearBy Maria Hussain (aka Karin Friedemann)Al-Jazeerah.info, May 15, 2004

At the recent Anti-Semitism Conference in Berlin, Yehuda Bauer, an Israeli official raised the spectre of a “totalitarian, radical Islamist ideology” based on the widespread Zionist belief that Muslim fundamentalists are ready for a second genocide of the Jewish people. It is rather ironic that the Israelis are appealing to the Germans for help, the very nation that got them into this mess. Transfer of funds from Nazi Germany in the 1930s made the Jewish State possible. Presumably, getting the Jews out of Germany was part of Hitler’s Final Solution. The idea that the State of Israel could ever provide security to Jewish persons is absurd given that Israel is Hitler’s baby. Why the Jews still to this day seem determined to bring about Hitler’s Final Solution upon themselves as some kind of self-fulfilling prophecy is worth asking. The creation of a Jewish gathering place and the subsequent efficiency of its obliteration would suffice as reason for Hitler’s funding of the State.

When confronted with their injustices, Semitists will invariably attempt to divert attention to the threat of Islamic anti-Semitism as the common enemy of mankind. This may seem like an irrational conclusion to anyone who has ever spoken with Arabs. The idea that Arabs want to exterminate all Jews can only be the subconscious projection of the Jewish obsession with exterminating Arabs. They assume the hatred to be mutual, but it is not. Arabs are the most secular and the most willing to compromise of all the Muslims. The terror Jews suffer at the dread of Arab vengeance is a comical expression of the repressed Jewish conscience. I believe the Arabs would consent to a non-Zionist, secular state in all of historical Palestine. I have never heard any public calls for collective punishment or expulsion of Jews from the Holy Land coming from any Palestinian organization, whether leftist or Islamist. The fear that Arabs want to drive Jews into the sea is something you only hear from Jews. The Jews’ attempt to criminalize Jihad is nothing more than a racist denial of the Arabs’ right to self-defense.

The Semitists’ terror of Islamic justice has blinded them to the reality of the threat they do not see. While it is untrue that Arabs wish to annihilate the Jews, there are perhaps hundreds of millions of people around the world who would simply call it God’s Justice. Since the assumptions promoted by anti-Islamic scholars are made from inferences based on Quranic verses quoted out of context and interpreted in ways that Muslims do not interpret them, it is not clear that these “scholars” are even aware of the vast body of Islamic literature attributed to the Prophet Mohammed that includes the entire Armegeddon scenario including the Mehdi, the return of Jesus the Messiah, the defeat of the Anti-Christ in Jerusalem, and the last genocide of the Jews at God’s command. The Islamic scholar, Maududi threw out this entire collection of ahadith as “unsound” fabrications and these prophecies are not taught as part of the core of Islamic teachings. However, they are widely circulated and accepted as truth by the mainstream of South Asian Muslim culture. Arabs are actually far less likely to await the liberation of Palestine by an Islamic army from Afghanistan waving black flags led by a Saudi Arabian war hero, but this hope, based on sayings attributed to Mohammed, seems to be a major part of the global Islamist coalition’s recruiting propaganda. The Zionists are largely unaware of it. They are still distracted by the idea of 70 virgins in paradise.

The Zionist belief in the ingathering of Jews in the Land of Israel was the adoption and subversion of the Biblical Revelations in the New Testament. The belief that Jews were physically expelled by the Romans from the Holy Land 2000 years ago is also borrowed from Christian theology. The Quranic mentions of Israelite claims on Palestine hold that the story of the Promised Land is a promise fulfilled. There is no further promise. Any future ingathering of Jews refers to the ingathering of every nation and tribe at the Day of Judgement after the Last Day, when we all will be called to judgement.

But the fundamentalist Christians, the fundamentalist Jews, and the fundamentalist Muslims are united in this idea that there has to be some military show-down between the Jewish Messiah and Jesus. Some of our useless passivity results from a feeling of inevitability based on the belief that all has been written. Is the Great Battle between Jesus and Dajjal a fundamental Islamic belief?

This entire world war is based on false assumptions based on messianistic expectations. If we entertain the possibility that the ahadith (the Prophet's sayings) related to the second coming of Jesus are borrowed from Christianity, and we limit our Islamic belief to what is clearly established in the Holy Quran and the “sound” ahadith, then there is no reason to think that the future of the world could not have a happy ending. There is no final destruction of the Jews and Christians and loss of Dhimmi status. All the Islamic laws requiring the just treatment of conquered minorities still hold.

There is nothing in the core of Islamic teachings that says that the future of our world is reduced to a final showdown between good and evil. In fact, this superstition is related to Zoroastrianism. The Quranic descriptions of the Last Days of the earth are more based in astronomy than politics. They seem to imply a gradual slowing down of the earths’ rotation to the point where gravity disappears and everything on earth goes flying off into space. This nightmare scenario makes nuclear armegeddon seem pretty mild in comparison. The idea that the destruction of Masjid Al Aqsa is inevitable, or that the Gog and Magog will use up all the water in the Sea of Galilee -- are these things we should accept? Have we been allowing these madmen to take over the Middle East because we have been sold into Freemasonic conspiracy theories? The idea that Muslims will defeat the Zionist World Order and establish a global Islamic order led by Jesus is not actually central to the Islamic religion. Given that we want peace for the sake of the children more than we need to base our decisions on these questionable ahadith, it may be wise for the Muslims to entertain the possibility that we may be giving the Jews far more credit than they deserve. Sure, they would love to be the priesthood of the New World Order. But their power is only that which we attribute to them. We can also just laugh at them.

Let us face the facts. Even the most sincere Muslims among us are not equipped to turn the situation around. Only Allah can help us, and we have to beg Him to show us how to build a sustainable society. But the devil is like a snake which eats its own tail. Evil sows the seeds of its own destruction. We can use our energy to create alternatives rather than just fighting bad guys all the time. Let us then stop waiting for the Messiah because there is a very real chance that all these End Time Islamic oral traditions were planted by Ismailis during the British Empire as a way of frightening Muslims into accepting the idea of an all-powerful world government led by Jews. The vast majority of Muslims are traumatized by violence or the fear of violence. This prophetic literature makes them fall into a black hole of helpless terror that stunts their effectiveness personally and collectively because death seems the only option. Either we can die as pathetic victims or we can die as men, fighting for the sake of Allah. There is a way out of this trap. There is an Islamic loophole.

If we stop believing in the supernatural powers of Jews, we no longer need to take for granted that the Zionists will forever strive to rebuild the Temple of Solomon, nor do we need to believe in the awesome Pharonic powers of Israel. It is enough for us to heed the Quranic warning against witchcraft and emulate the noble character of the Islamic King Solomon who was so merciful that he avoided stepping on ants. It may be that we can use the great minds that Allah gave us in order to establish a just society which protects the weak. Whether it’s a secular and multi-cultural nation with an Islamic majority, or it’s an Islamic state with political bodies representing minority communities who conduct their own internal affairs, we can do this. If we forget about the End Time prophecies and concentrate on the Lowest Common Denominator that we can all agree on, that we hold it as self-evident that all men were created equal; we could start from there. Naturally, there are mighty men with terrible weapons who will stand in the way of the success of convincing Jews to give up their neurotic superiority complexes. These people will have to be fought and defeated. But we can fight injustice with a sense of inner peace -- not revenge. We can use our intellectual capabilities and our inner faith to build a society that is sustainable.

It could be true that the end of the world is at hand. But God’s time is different than human time. It is all too convenient to believe that a Messiah is coming to solve all our problems. The fact is, the Messiah has already come and he is now sitting at the Right Hand of the Lord. He is going to pray for his followers on the Day of Judgement but that is all we know for sure. It could be that there are many many centuries that we must struggle through before we reach the climactic end of all of humanity’s efforts. Even the End Time prophecies state that on the Last Day, if you have a sapling in your hand you should plant it. We are not allowed to give up hope. This is because we never know if this could just be one of many trials from our Lord.

We have tried the path of unrestrained materialism and it has gotten us into a bad place. We have tried the path of unrestrained idealism and it has not gotten us out of that bad place. Since we have all tried so hard and still failed, perhaps we should try something else. We all need each other because we all want the same thing. It is easy to die but it is harder to live free. And yet that is what we have to find a way how to do. The Path lies within our hearts and leads to the Source of all that is. There is no Islam or peace without free will and mutual respect. We all need to find the courage to ask questions, to let go of opinions, and have faith in the ultimate goodness of destiny. I believe we will find that when we give ourselves the freedom to know and to strive for what we really want, it will still be Islam that we want: the best possible interpretation of Islam as a balanced holistic circle that cherishes all life and recognizes no human master.

2 comments:

It isn't really necessary to debunk eschatology, it is much easier to postpone it to an indefinite far future. I say, could you please provide some support for the statement: "there is a very real chance that all these End Time Islamic oral traditions were planted by Ismailis during the British Empire as a way of frightening Muslims into accepting the idea of an all-powerful world government led by Jews."